Introduction
I
posted the following text to the Facebook group “Bobcat Pride” on
either June 22nd or 23rd, 2020.
The
“Bobcat Pride” group, as well as another Facebook group called
“Scouts Pride”, were created to allow residents of Lake Bluff and
Lake Forest, Illinois, to discuss emerging allegations concerning
inappropriate sexual conduct between former Lake Forest High School
theater director David “Dave” Miller and several teenage boys who
attended L.F.H.S. while Miller taught there.
Less
than twelve hours after posting the following message, my post was removed from Bobcat Pride, and I was removed from both
groups (even though I only posted in one of them).
I
wrote the following message to the members of Bobcat Pride, to inform
them that Dave Miller is not the only parent or teacher in
Lake Bluff or Lake Forest who molested, or had inappropriate sexual
interactions with, a child, in the last twenty years.
I
did not write the following message to attract attention to myself,
nor to smear members of the community. I apologize if the fact that I
named so many names, made it come off that way, but that was not my
intention.
I
wrote this to warn parents in Lake County that there are still child
molesters walking free, and that they are trusted members of our
community. I wrote this to explain to Lake County parents that the
majority of molestation allegations in our area have not been
properly dealt with by authorities (with the exception of Diane
Ross); and also to caution Lake Bluff residents that it might not be
possible to trust the mayor of Lake Bluff to deal with these
situations, given her past treatment of children.
The
only things that have been changed about the below text, are: 1)
replacement of all-caps phrases with italics; 2) the addition of
periods to the abbreviations of school names; 3) the removal of the
surname of the children of a child sex criminal, which was removed in
order to protect the innocent; and 4) the addition of clarifications,
outlined in brackets.
[Note:
Shortly after posting this, I was told for the second time that the
former owners of Sweet's ice cream store in Lake Forest – Jonathan
and Susan Dick – molested children. I was told about this several
months prior, but I had forgotten about it. I recently discovered
that there is a book about it, titled Straying Towards Truth,
written by Karen Fennell.]
My Message to the Group
Thanks
so much to the creators of this group for making it.
I
was in the L.F.H.S. class of 2005. I knew Miller from stage crew, but
I only knew him as a hard-ass and never witnessed any inappropriate
sexual behavior. I'm very sorry to hear about this news though, I
don't doubt it at all, as rape and molestation are acts of aggression
and Miller is prone to angry outbursts.
I'm
posting because I know about more L.F.H.S. students who were molested
(not by Miller; by parents in the community).
Does
anyone remember this headline from 2000? Diane Ross, mother of two LF
[i.e., Lake Forest High School] students with the last name of
[redacted], was arrested for child porn. I was 13 at the time. I
found out from my younger brother, who probably heard it from
friends. My father only found out years later, and my mom didn't know
until recently. I don't remember getting a talk about it from my
parents at the time.
Nor
do I remember any kind of school assembly being called, to inform
parents that one of the other parents was a child pornographer. If no
assembly was called and no parents were informed by the school, then
I suspect that gross negligence at best, and/or deliberate cover-up
at worst, could be afoot.
Diane
Ross's children attended Lake Bluff Middle School with me and my
brother, but I think her older child had entered L.F.H.S. by the time
Ross was arrested. I believe that the principal of L.B.M.S. at this
time was Kathleen o'Hara, also known as "Kathy" and "Ms.
O". O'Hara later became the mayor of Lake Bluff.
My
earliest memory of Kathleen o'Hara occurred some time between 1994
and 1996, when I was 7 to 9. A kid I knew smoked pot had been
bullying me, so in defense I tried to call attention to the fact that
this 7 or 8 or 9 year old boy smoked pot. Instead of telling me
"thanks for bringing attention to this, that kid's parents were
letting him get high", Kathleen o'Hara screamed at me at the top
of her lungs until I cried, because she said that under no
circumstances was I supposed to use the word "pot".
I
believe that Kathleen o'Hara's confrontational "disciplinary"
style - screaming at small children until they cry - contributed to
the creation of an environment in which it would have been impossible
for a child to report abuse. That's because what o'Hara did to us,
inculcated an immediate fear of authority rather than a
healthy respect for it.
Our
lack of freedom to resist whatever our principal wanted to inflict
upon us (screaming, strictly obeyed rules, etc), conditioned and
primed us for the abuse that many of us would have to endure at home
at the hands of our parents.
Screaming
and strict obedience to rules aside, some parents felt free to dote
on our looks to the point of flirtation, and used school plays and
concerts as excuses to obsess over the way we looked. They dressed us
up in the kind of suits that adults would wear, and ignored us when
we complained that our collars were too tight. Parents obsessed with
their children's looks are not healthy. We must learn to recognize
these warning signs of pedophile grooming when we see them.
My
father took advantage of the school giving him free rein to obsess
over his child's looks and clothing, to touch me wherever he pleased.
The last or second last time he molested me (Dec 23, 1996, Chicago,
Union League Club Hotel), it started as he and I going to the hotel
room so he could help me change clothes.
My
father, Richard Steven Kopsick - a Waukegan-based attorney, former
Lake County BAR Association president, and former District 65 school
board member (serving alongside o'Hara) - molested me as many as
20 times between 1992 and 1996 (ages 5-9).
He
disguised his molestation as tickling. The overwhelming tickling, and
his arms clamped down over my chest during the abuse, restricted the
blood flow to my brain at the time, making it difficult to form new
memories at the time. As a result. I had absolutely no memory of the
abuse between either 1997 or 2000, and 2014. I recovered memories of
the abuse without the help of a therapist, and reported the abuse to
the Lake Bluff police on Dec[ember] 31[st,] 2019.
When
I returned to Illinois from Oregon in 2015, my father knew I had
begun talking about the abuse. He enlisted psychologists Sol
Rappaport and Michael Feld to prescribe me an antidepressant before
they had ever met me or seen my "symptoms" (a/k/a my
criticizing my father for abusing me).
My
father then convinced my mother and uncle that I was mentally ill and
needed medication, and they tried to get me to take the pills. I
later found out that they cause suicidal thoughts and paralysis. They
would have left me unable to speak about the abuse, and I believe
that my father's intention was to drug me with neurodisruptors so
that I couldn't think straight and couldn't remember the abuse
clearly.
My
father's former law partner, Waukegan based attorney Scott Gibson,
used to throw pool parties at his house. He would pinch the asses of
all his friends' children underneath the water, and be open about it,
screaming "there's a butt-biter in the pool". Everybody
thought it was hilarious at the time, but all the kids would run away
from him, and I realized years later how completely inappropriate it
was. Everyone was drinking, so nobody cared, and everyone involved
(except me) has been drinking since then, so few people probably
remember. Members of the Kopsick family, Gibsons, Callaghans,
Skinners, Mocognis, and others should remember. Most of their kids
got pinched on the ass by Gibson at some point between 1994-2000. I
discovered in 2015 that Gibson did heroin back in the 1970s.
I
also heard a rumor that a female from the L.F.H.S. class of 2005 was
raped by her father.
Brad
Anderson paid for a webcam girl who went to school with his sons (she
was over 18 when she webcammed for him though).
Former
police officers Dan Dunn and Carl Schons are Nazi sympathizers.
My
father probably colluded with prosecutor Steve Scheller to let this
young woman named Melissa Calusinski go to prison for 10 years after
a baby accidentally died in her care.
Ordinary
People, and the works of John Hughes and Todd Solondz, show that
Hollywood is familiar with the fact that children of wealthy and
suburban families get abused too. But I don't think anyone could have
foreseen the magnitude on which this "conspiracy of silence"
occurs.
"All
that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing"
- Edmund Burke
Miller
needs to go to prison.
I
don't know if Kathleen o'Hara is still the Lake Bluff mayor, or even
alive still [Note: She is both alive and still the mayor of Lake
Bluff], but she needs to answer for her negligence in failing to
adequately inform parents of Diane Ross's child pornography arrest,
and in failing to adequately counsel students over that (hushed)
"news".
I
think that if Miller goes down, o'Hara should go down with him. My
father knew o'Hara and served on the school board while she was
principal, so my father - and the silent grooming environment created
in the school by o'Hara and the board - should be the next things
under investigation after that. Then Gibson, whose pinching was
witnessed by at least a dozen people, including at least 8-10 kids
who attended District 65 &/or 67 schools.
We
will not be shushed and gaslit into submission. I suggest that a full
list be created of all L.F.H.S. and L.B.M.S. parents and staff
suspected of child porn or molestation, and that that list be turned
into a petition, circulated among the community, and then turned into
police, as well as various media, and also addressed to each
of the area's schools.
Notes:
1. I regret calling Carl Schons a Nazi sympathizer, but not Dan Dunn. What happened was this: Some time between 1995 and 2000, I was at a party with my parents and their friends. It was probably at the home of either the Dunns, or one of the Skinner families. I overheard Dan Dunn whispering to Carl Schons something like “You know, it's not like the Germans had no reason to do what they did. The Jews owned all the industry and they were polluting a lot.”. Carl Schons didn't say anything back that seemed to sympathize, but he did smile and nod approvingly, and he did not object to anything Dunn was telling him. It's entirely possible that Schons is not a Nazi sympathizer; if he isn't, then I deeply regret dragging him into this. But I strongly suspect that Mr. Dunn meant what he said. Both men should be able to remember this; if they don't, it's most likely because they were drinking at the time, and because it happened about 25 years ago.]
2. I recommend that if a list of likely child molesters is circulated in the community, then it should include Diane Ross, David "Dave" Miller, Jonathan Dick a/k/a "Jonathan D. Jonathan", Susan Dick, Richard S. "Rich" Kopsick, Scott B. Gibson, and an unknown who molested boys at the Lake Bluff public pool in the 1990s. There may also be additional parents, and gym teachers, in the District 67 system (Lake Forest) who have molested children. 
